I am standing in this sea of people, standing in my all white, caught defenseless, the park, the spring air. There’s my teacher, one of my closest friends. And another of my closest friends, the one with the kisses, the desert, the ghost. There’s the girl that used to sleep with my ex-boyfriend, there she is now beside her husband. Here I am now holding this friend’s baby, and now this one. Here they are crying, laughing, drooling on my sunglasses. There’s the sound of the merry-go-round in the distance, maniacal. Here I am missing my lover, here I am standing alone with my eyes turned up to the sun. Here I am, washed ashore in a sea of possibilities and wondering to myself, what does it mean, to live a good life? And for me, more specifically, to live deeply, completely, into the fullest expression of myself as a woman? Must it come with the husband, the partner, must it come with the baby, all these babies that seem laughable within the context of my studio apartment and my lovers and my long work days? Must it come even with the good job and the decent income and the wild spark of art, all these things I hear people speak of, ascribe to me, place onto my identity like a medal, well-earned? Must any of this matter? Is this all there is? Here I am, washed ashore in a sea of other peoples’ possibilities, here I am naked within my own skin, laughing at the nothingness of it all, here I am, long days ago already writing these words in my head, searching for meaning the only way I know how.